White Officer Fatally Shoots Black Man

Published 1:50 pm, Monday, April 25, 2016

A crowd threw rocks and bottles at police after a white officer shot and killed a black man driving a stolen car near a Martin Luther King Jr. Day festival.

Police said Detective James Johns, 30, was struck by the Lincoln Continental before shooting Eddie Lee Macklin, 20.

Some witnesses said that plainclothes officers swarmed the car and that Johns was not struck but jumped on the hood and fired through the windshield.

The shooting happened Monday as hundreds of people were leaving the festival a couple of blocks away in Liberty City.

Immediately after the shooting, a small crowd threw rocks and bottles at detectives, but the violence ended quickly after about 75 uniformed officers arrived. It was unclear if any detectives were hit; police made no arrests.

Johns was treated at a hospital for minor back and leg injuries and released.

Authorities said Macklin had been arrested 12 times in Palm Beach County since 1996 for assaulting a police officer, vehicle theft and narcotics charges.

Clifton Massey, who said he witnessed the shooting, criticized police for firing near a crowded area.

"If the guy was in a stolen car, they should have followed him to an area that was not so congested and apprehended him there," Massey said. "They had enough police presence to make sure he couldn't get away. The Rambo stuff, that was not necessary."